The Story of Annie D.

She's seen her times and her town change forever, and when murder destroys the peace, she knows that nothing can be the way it once was. "Absolutely stunning... Reads with the force and generational sweep of some ancient rural myth." -New York Times Book Review More

A clear, dry voice, stripped of sentiment or passion, narrates an absorbing saga of love, madness and murder set in the small town of Wizen River, Neb. The voice belongs to long-widowed Annie Diettermann, who has also endured the death of two young sons. Interspersed with her bleak family history is Annie's continuing chronicle about her wealthy friend Phoebe, whose disgraced daughter Lacey is sent to California to bear an illegitimate son fathered by disreputable Casey Boots, a youngster from the unsavory section of town. Lacey, still embittered by her exile, returns nine years later for her mother's funeral and is reunited with Casey. They attempt to start a new life, and it is at this juncture that a series of crimes begins. Three young women are raped and murdered, and each victim has a lock of hair shorn. Annie D. accidentally discovers the murderer, and her solution--tragic, inevitable, wise--resoundingly closes the books on the slayings.This authentically and distinctively cadenced first novel marks a promising debut. -Publishers Weekly

Susan Taylor Chehak is a graduate of the University of Iowa Writers Workshop and the author of several novels, including The Great Disappointment, Smithereens, The Story of Annie D., and Harmony. Her most recent publications include a collection of short stories, It's not About the Dog; a new novel, The Minor Apocalypse of Meena Krejci; and a work of nonfiction, What Happened to Paula: The Anatomy of a True Crime. Susan has taught fiction writing in the low residency MFA program at Antioch University, Los Angeles, the UCLA Extension Writers' Program, the University of Southern California, and the Summer Writing Festival at the University of Iowa. She grew up in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, spent many years in Los Angeles, lives occasionally in Toronto, and at present calls Colorado her home.